About the State Council painting above, I recently read that it is a huge painting and was hanging in a large room in one of the palaces. The Kerensky gov't had a meeting that needed to take place in a big room, so they had their meeting right there under that portrait -- but covered it with a big red cloth! Funny. I guess they didn't want to destroy the painting because it is a masterpiece, and done by a liberal member of the intelligentsia, Ilya Repin. Too bad Serov's portrait didn't fare as well.
All those circles of chairs converge on the small man in the back holding a piece of paper. The painting shows how much concentration all the men focus on the figure of the Tsar. Tough job for a shy fellow.
